Disasters - Names		Disasters - Names

Date:	10th October 1913
Colliery:	Holmside, Edward
Cause:	(See description below)
Lives Lost:	1

At Craghead Colliery, Durham, a lad went to hew some coals in a place into which he was not authorised to go, and which was not in a safe condition to work in without certain precautions first being taken. His experience did not fit him to understand or take these precautions. In consequence a fall occurred whilst he was working there, and inflicted fatal injuries. The place was a bord just being turned away in solid coal. Before further hewing was done there, the top canch should have been taken down. It was a place in which work was temporarily stopped, and was not fenced off; the deputy had examined it and he considered it to be safe. The deputy told the lad to hew in another place. He, however, entered the bord and hewed there. In a short time he exposed some slips which unkeyed the top stone, which promptly fell.

Source:

1913 Mines Inspectors Report

Birbeck, Christopher, aged 20, Putter, deceased with other putters was allowed to hew at times; on the 10th October they were told by the deputy to hew in a certain place; deceased went to hew in another place and had only got started when a triangular shaped piece of stone fell from the roof on to him; the place was a bord 6 feet wide, which had been turned away and driven a distance of 2 feet by another putter the previous night; top stone, 18 inches thick, was down in the headways, and this stone forming the roof in the bord was not supported in any way; the stone (triangular) was bounded by the free side to the headways, a slip, and broke at the third side; the upper surface had no adhesion, being quite slippery; a plank under the brow of the canch would have prevented the accident

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